#26: Ketones Unlocked: The Science, Benefits, and Future of Nature’s Superfuel with Frank Llosa

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Welcome to the Architect of Resilience podcast, where
we explore the secrets of overcoming life's challenges and
unlocking unstoppable strength through. Deep personal
conversations and expert insights. Longer skis, if you're not
that good, is trying to slow down. Well, make your skis super slow. I mean,
super short. And then you can go straight down double black diamond with moguls. And

(00:22):
feel like, I need
to carry it on your luggage. Like, carry on luggage. It's that small. Man,
that's brilliant. I need to get
up on the hills myself. I've got my
snowboarding as my thing. Pretty. Pretty big up here in the Northwest.
So, yeah, I've always wanted to try that. Looks like it'd be a lot of

(00:45):
fun. Little. If you're. If you're ready. If you're ready to
go, like, five times smashing on your ass,
then that's. Fine. For a while.
You're just gonna be hurting a lot and hitting, like, literally. You need to get
Charmin, like two Charmin rolls and stick them on your butt. And I'm not kidding,

(01:06):
because you would just unexpectedly fall on your ass.
I look like the Stay Puff, Marshmallow man and Ghostbusters. Yeah.
Well, now that I'm down to 240, 230, 240 range, like,
it's. I need to get up. When I was at 280
and not mobile. Like, it was. It was. It
fall down, and I couldn't reach my. I couldn't reach my bindings, and it was

(01:28):
just like, I. As soon as I stand up, I'm like, there's this.
It actually was. Ended up on Fox Sports. It
was because I went snowboarding with no. With no shirt on and.
And fat bells in my hands. I was just
like. So I'm down the slopes. I'm. My sister was behind
me. She's. She's worked the mountains for, like, 15

(01:50):
years or 20 years, so she's. She's really amazing. So she was
GoPro behind me and went all the way down behind me,
and it's a really epic video because you wouldn't expect somebody like me to.
Actually, if I'm standing, I snowboard really well. But at the time,
it's like, if I fell over, then there'd be a problem.
Man, that would have been awesome. Yeah, well, I. I

(02:13):
was. I. I hit record because I thought this conversation was kind of funny, but
just hit my ketones. So.
Frank, I honestly don't know how to pronounce your
last name. How do you say that? The double Ls is a Y
sound. So I like to say Yosa like Llama just to confuse people. So

(02:34):
it's Llama.
Frank Llama or Frank Yosa. Well,
I want to welcome everybody. Yeah, I
want to welcome everybody back to our architect of
resilience. Today, let's jump into discussion. So we're doing a
deep dive into metabolic health and performance optimization.

(02:56):
I mean, two areas where science application converge
to redefine what's possible. So joining us today
is Frank Llama.
Frank Yosa, founder and CEO of Ketone Aid, a visionary
force pioneering the realm of exogenous ketones and
ketone esters. These compounds are reshaping how we

(03:18):
understand energy, endurance and mental clarity. Which
is why I just down some. I know you guys had some just before we
started. Not as a, a vague promise, but
as tangible tools for peak performance. Frank
Story is one of relentless curiosity from competitive sports to the
frontier front lines of biohacking. His journey is a testament

(03:40):
to a principle I hold dear myself. The synthesis
of knowledge and lived experience. Like putting those two
together. So under his leadership, Ketone Aid has
created products that's field transformations, empowering elite
athletes and everyday individuals alike to unlock new levels of
potential. Today's conversation, it's more of a science

(04:02):
talk. Today it's about mastery. We'll explore the biochemistry behind
ketones, their role in energy metabolism and their
implications for daily life. Whether you're chasing,
you know, podium finishes, battling brain fog during
grueling work days, or simply seeking clarity in a chaotic
world. This episode, I hope that we can offer strategies

(04:24):
to integrate these super fields into your life
and hopefully provide some clarity for our users. As I
have been learning in recent months, how valuable they are
outside of a, you know, a
carnivore, a keto type, a carb depleted
diet. So expect actionable strategies, some

(04:46):
hard truths and perhaps challenge to rethink how
you approach fuel and function. So let's
prepare to redefine your relationship with energy and performance
with the none other. Frank Yosa, let's
get to work talking. How's that for an intro?
Thank you. Good, Sounds good. So obviously

(05:09):
I've got my co host Anthony Castor who's
joined me on all of the cellular medicine series. So I consider
this one an extension and hope to have Anthony co hosting a bit more
because Anthony is well more versed on the ketone world that
I am learning in. Interesting. I
did have some very early experiences when they first came to market,

(05:32):
when Patrick Arnold first did the synthesis and
brought some out. I used the salts for a Very limited period of time and
I didn't see honestly that much of an impact on
them at that point in time. God, that was maybe
eight years ago. I can't remember. That's the exact number. I was gonna say eight,
maybe even nine for the racemic salts. Yeah. Let's dive into the world of

(05:54):
optimizing your overall health. With pushing my physical limits, I
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(06:16):
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That's code resilience for 10% off.
For listeners unfamiliar with the science, can you explain

(06:38):
what ketones are and how they function as an energy
source in the body? Great. So for the
most part the body can run on two fuel sources, glucose,
sugar and ketones. But the world hasn't
really experienced ketones because it's hard for your body to tap
into that. So some people call it an emergency fuel source or

(07:00):
a fourth food group. So you got carbs, protein, fat,
and then now you've got ketones in its own, in its
own group. So the way to trigger your body to make its own ketones
is one of two ways, multi day fast. So
two, three days, just water or no water, and your body will be
starved of glucose and your body will say, hey, if you don't stop,

(07:23):
if you don't start, you know, giving me more sugar, I'm going to go to
your fat reserves, shove the fat through the liver and convert it
into ketones. And you can actually test your blood ketones with a
50 meter to see what number you're at. And people say if it hits 0.5
then you're in ketosis, the state of having ketones in
your blood. We'll talk about how ketosis is defined. Some people define it

(07:44):
as ketones in your blood and some people define it as burning fat to make
ketones. But the ketogenic diet is another way to do it. So you
just lower your sugar intake, but you're still eating a lot of fat, 80%
fat, 15% protein, 5% carbs.
And that ketogenic diet state will also reduce
your sugar and make it so your Body says, hey, I need one of the

(08:06):
two fuel sources. If you don't give me more carbs, I'm going to go burn
fat to make ketones. What I work in is in the category
of exogenous ketones. So drinking it externally,
exogenous ketones, so I can talk about the different types in a second. But when
you drink this, it will skip the fat burning step. So a
lot of companies will claim you know, you're in ketosis in 30

(08:28):
minutes and hyper. Technically, scientifically,
ketosis is defined as ketones in your blood. But most consumers
hear the word ketosis and they think fat burning. So it's like this
misleading trick with a lot of these companies that they say, hey, drink this in
30 minutes and you're in ketosis. And the consumer thinks, great, I can
watch tv, drink this drink and be burning fat. This is amazing.

(08:49):
It just doesn't work that way. And we even have a chart of like 10
of our products and all the different things that they can do and when to
take different ones. And one of them says weight loss and I just put a
red X all the way across it. Because if you don't understand
and haven't listened to a podcast like this, you're just going to be disappointed and
want to return it and be like, hey, I didn't lose any weight on it.
Well, my father in law hasn't lost any weight and he's been taking it for

(09:11):
three years. So if you don't use it right or if you don't
understand how to use it, it's not going to, it's not going to stop
you, it's not going to help you burn fat.
There will be many of the other metabolic benefits of the ketogenic diet and brain
flow and recovery. There are many other
benefits to it, but just not the fat burning. So within

(09:34):
exogenous ketones you then have multiple categories. I like to
call the MCT Oil C8, I like to call that half
of an exogenous ketone because 15% of it will
actually convert into beta hydroxybutyrate. That's the molecule that your body makes when
you burn fat. But then you've got 85%. That kind of count towards
your fat macros on a ketogenic diet.

(09:56):
There's issues with the MCT oil GI problems if you have half of
a teaspoon too much. The number two video on my
YouTube site is my wife took slightly too much like seven
years ago and she just bowed over like, oh, and just all these stomach
pains I feel like people are, you know, it goes right. Out the other end
for me. If I, yeah, green apple, quick step.

(10:19):
They call that, they call that the diarrhea diet.
It will create that. But even, even if your body, even if over time
you're able to slowly take it and take more of it, yes, you can get
your body, your ketones up to 0.5, 1.0.
But Dr. Veach, who got me into all of this, he's my wife's
God, was my wife's godfather. He passed away in 2020.

(10:41):
He was not a fan of C8. He talked about the different. While it might
raise your blood ketones and people might want to just compare products,
ketone levels in the blood to each other, there's many more
things that are going on behind the scenes. And he thought that there was more
negative than positive. So he was never a fan of that. So I eat keto
and technically vegan, but I've been keto for the last, you know, six, seven

(11:03):
years. And I just use liquid coconut oil on my
food. I don't even use the, you know, the C8. So then there's
that. And then the next category is called ketone salts.
Now, one problem with the initial ketone salts, which is probably why you never noticed
anything, was that they were racemic, which means that only half of it is
bioavailable. So the body can't use as

(11:25):
an energy source. And I say that because some people are saying that, well,
maybe there's some signaling benefits. Okay, maybe. But as an
energy source, as a calorie, half of it doesn't work. So you might see on
these bottles 10 grams of BHB salts, but
only 5 of it is bioavailable. And there's
some theories that the form that your body

(11:47):
can't use may block the correct form, the D form or the
R form from actually working. So that 10 becomes 5 becomes 4. And then
you have this massive salt load, like 1 or 2, 3
grams of salt, sodium, potassium, magnesium, different
types of salts, and then those will further block the ketones. And then
ultimately, in the end, it doesn't do anything. Now, some people have

(12:09):
benefit. They think that they find benefit in them for one
of two reasons. One, a lot of these drinks will add caffeine. Well, the
ketones will multiply the caffeine 2 or 3x, but not in a good
way. You could just have 3x the amount of coffee if you wanted to, but
you don't because you get jitters or you get a bigger crash.
So we'll do that. So people want to feel it with those racemic salts. And

(12:30):
then the, I mentioned the salt content is just, you
know, way too high and unbalanced.
So that's the, the racemic salts. Then.
Then they came out with the non racemic salts and mostly the R form.
And that's better. Better than the other stuff. It might look like it costs

(12:51):
twice as much, but it's actually equally cost
effective if, you know, half of it is bioavailable. So if one box says
10, you would be looking for something that says four to be the
equivalent. Setting aside the extra salt load,
that is problematic. So it cuts the salt load in half. You know, the non
racemic is much better, but still, the salt load is still too

(13:13):
high. There might be instances where you're in like a super sweaty, you know,
motocross or something where you need more electrolytes, you know, then maybe you
can take them. Oh, the second reason why it might work for people initially is
when they enter into a ketogenic diet, people lose weight
very quickly. But what they think they're losing is fat. What they're really
losing is water weight. Yeah, that water weight just depletes out of the

(13:36):
mouth, out of the muscles. Like, I know, you know, any
individual like myself or Anthony that's got a significant
amount of muscle mass on them, like, I can swing 10 or
15 pounds in body weight like in a matter of,
you know, a day or two if I choose to, just by
manipulating water and, and salt

(13:57):
levels. And it sounds really wild, but you can do
it really easy with muscle tissue and same thing. You can also
dehydrate your fat tissue and, you know, not lose any fat as
well. But the glycogen stores in the muscle, like switching those dietary
styles, like if I drop my carbohydrate intake, it'll just,
I'll just dump so much water over, you know, over a course of a day

(14:18):
and then all of a sudden swing back up and it's like, hey, I just
put on £7 today. Well, yeah, I didn't put on
£7. Yeah, exactly. So with
that massive water loss, when someone enters into a ketogenic diet, they
lose tons of salt. And I say to people, have you been replenishing
with salt? And they say, yeah, I put more salt on my eggs. And I
say, did you unscrew the salt container? Like, that's the

(14:41):
amount of salt, like massive amounts of salt. So when people take these
exogenous ketones that are ketone salts that are racemic it's the salt
that's actually maybe doing some benefit, getting them out of the keto flu. Because when
you don't have enough salt, you don't have, you know,
electricity going through your system. Yeah. People don't
understand the. The impact of salt. As you know,

(15:04):
it's. There's been so much misinformation for so long when we get visitors
to our house, you know, family, friends that are outside of the fitness community and
unfamiliar, if they're like, why is there salt containers everywhere?
And why are you salting the drinks that you're making? It's like, that's what we
do here. Like, I know you're the same
way, Anthony. The people that are taking the racemic salts, they could save a whole

(15:26):
bunch of money just by buying just other, you know, other salt
packets or pink Himalayan sea salt.
They would save a lot of money. Some companies try to sell
these pills, either gummies or capsules that,
you know, people think that the ketone ester is expensive. And I try to do
the math for them and say in one of our servings is

(15:47):
more ketones than maybe the entire bottle
of this 20, 30, 40 bottle where they have this, you know,
fraction of the ketone salts and, you know, maybe placebo
effect, maybe the salt is benefiting them. But the ketone salts, for
the most part, are, you know, still worthless.
And then ketone ester is D beta

(16:08):
hydroxybutyrate, bound to R1,3 butane dial. And I say the
bound to because that's really important. It's not just free floating in the water. It's
actually a chemical bond. And drug companies will make things into an ester
form in order to enter the blood, but also in order to enter the
brain. So like Levodopa, you can eat, you
can consume dopamine, and it'll get into your bloodstream, but it won't get into your

(16:30):
brain. So they make Levodopa in order to be able to get
through both systems. So the ketone ester initially they thought was
cleaved in the gut, but then recent papers found that the
ketone ester actually made it intact into the blood. And now what we're trying to
do is prove that maybe it goes intact into the brain more
readily. That's why when different companies might have a product that goes

(16:52):
to one millimolar. One millimolar, one millimolar, you would think, okay, we'll just
buy the thing that's the cheapest that will get you to 1
millimolar. But the experience people have Is just drastically
different when they have the ester, 1 millimolar worth of the ester
versus versus other stuff. And there's a couple other ketone esters
that have been popping up that are technically ketone ester, but this is the only

(17:12):
one that's a ketone mono ester. Mono means one bond.
So there's a couple other ones that are kind of confusing the marketplace. Some
of them are 18 bioavailable. So it sounds great, five bucks
for 25 grams, but it doesn't do the same amount
as a fraction of our stuff. So we still think that ours
is the best value. And initially we would sell these

(17:35):
$30 bottles and people would drink the entire bottle. And
then, because that was based on mice data, but then over time, people were like,
well, I took half and I had a better workout, or I took a quarter
and then it went down and down. Before you knew it, the cap became the
measuring tool. So One capful is
$2.25 worth. And some people are able to take

(17:55):
that little. Most people will take two capfuls, so like five bucks
a day and use it for many things first thing in the morning, or
they'll use it pre workout. Some people would rather use it post workout. Some
people actually use it before bed to go to sleep, which is
counterintuitive. So there's. Yeah, I've had good
success with all of those strategies. I do 40

(18:17):
to 60 milliliters a day. You do you
take an entire bottle per day? Yes. All right, that's. That's a little bit on
the high side. But, you know, if you find the benefits and, you know, people
say, hey, it's made my business more profitable. It's made me, you know, you know,
it's. It's chump change based on the return that I've been able to get from
it, then great. But that's on the high side. But one of the things I

(18:37):
was curious about, and I know you can answer this, I do get the
benefit like pre workout and post workout and
sleep. And those are three completely different situations. Like pre
workout, I feel like I'm able to train longer.
My understanding is it's improving the efficiency of the cell and
using energy better post workout. It's my

(18:58):
understanding is it's going to keep the insulin levels elevated a little bit
longer and potentially increase
HIF1A. So might be some benefits for
erythropoietin. And before or
before bed. My understanding is potentially give your
brain a fuel source so you're not. I don't know, somehow that's maybe

(19:20):
blunting cortisol response. But it's
almost like these ketones are so smart. They know what to do at the right
time. Could you. Yeah, they adapt. They adapt. And what you were
mentioning the post workout. Yes. To the epo. The other two
I hadn't heard of. So it's above my pay grade. So something that Dr. Seeds
said then. Yes, but, you know, the insulin. Hadn't heard about that. But

(19:41):
from. For recovery, there was a clinical trial where they simulated a Tour de
France three week, four to five hours a day. They weren't
elite athletes. They were well trained athletes. There's a difference.
And the ketone ester group was 15% faster
in the end and able to do 15% more watts in their last few
days of training. So now in the cycling world, it's. It's

(20:04):
kind of the default in the Tour de France. Like, it's just, it's everywhere.
We sponsor two or three teams and
80% of the teams, you know, order from us. So it's
just, it's everywhere. And the default now, and
there's been some discussion. Oh, should we ban it? Well, you ban things that are
unhealthy. I mean, cycling's unhealthy. And what this is

(20:26):
doing is actually recovering you and making you healthier.
So they were supposed to do studies a couple
years ago, and I don't know if they were too
beneficial that they decided not to post them, but
yeah, so it's a default in cycling, but it can be used in many other
sports, like sports that have tbi. Traumatic brain injury

(20:50):
for those people that have had TBI previously. I talked to one
NHL guy. He's like seven years trying to do
chamber, you know, pressure chambers, all these different
biohacking things, 10 different things. And I said, this will work the first time. He's
like, oh, that's kind of confident of you. How can you be so sure? I'm
like, certain things I know work 20 of the time, and certain things I

(21:11):
know work 90 of the time. TBI, 90 of the time.
He drank it, didn't call me for a week. And I called him up. I'm
like, hey, we had a phone call for about an hour. What happened? He's like,
I just went back to normal. It just reset everything back to
normal. And okay, so it wasn't just a relief
during that period of time from the TBI symptoms. It is a four hour.

(21:32):
It lasts about four hours. So it's, it's the brain with the tbi. It's the
brain is not able to metabolize glucose. So taking more
glucose, that pathway is blocked. Ketone ester bypasses that pathway
and just resets it. And I asked Dr. Veach about. They did a
mice study. We didn't do it, but it was done before my time where they
gave a traumatic brain injury to the mouse. And you know,

(21:54):
beforehand they were able to walk the maze in whatever, 30 seconds. And then
after the TBI, it was, they weren't able to walk it, period. They
couldn't get to the other end. Then they gave them either a ketogenic diet or
a ketogenic. Ketogenic diet or ketone ester, two separate things. And
it worked both ways. And they were able to walk the maze
in 30 seconds. I said to Dr. Beach, well, they just had a TBI.

(22:16):
They must have been 10% slower. 20, you know something. And he's like, what
part of baseline do you not understand? Like, they went back to baseline.
The TBI was blocking off the sugar. You gave it the other fuel source
and it just filled it up. Which is why some people, some people, when they
take the ketone ester, lower amounts, like maybe like Anthony, the lower amounts, some people
feel nothing. Because if you don't have a blockage, it's not really a stimulant.

(22:39):
It doesn't, it's not a caffeine, it doesn't take you to 110. But the bigger
brain energy gap that you have, the more it fills that void.
So sometimes people are like, they'll take it like that hockey player and you'll say,
why is this not a billion dollar cover, billion dollar company on the COVID
of Time magazine? I'm like, because not everyone feels what
you just felt. So it works differently for different people.

(23:01):
Really interesting. Do you know if it has any effect on
the inflammation? That's. Yes. So it does a lot
of anti inflammation stuff. So part of
the pre workout benefits is anti inflammation in
two ways. One is people take it instead of sugar. So a lot of
people like to talk about sugar and ketones and that's what a lot of the

(23:23):
clinical trials have done. And I'm just, if it works
for you, great. But I'm not necessarily a big fan of that because the sugar
is so inflammatory and creates lactic acid. Ketones create
none. So when you're removing the sugar and you're just having
ketones, how much of the benefit is what the ketones are doing and how much
of the benefit is just not having the sugar? The negative. So

(23:44):
yes, it has a very anti inflammatory effect and we've, we saw it in
some pre long Covid.
No, during COVID when there are breathing issues people were able to take the
ketones and have a 25% improvement in breathing
in 15, 30 minutes. So that's, we suspect
that's the anti inflammatory effect. People with asthma. My nephew

(24:07):
is a swimmer and you can hear him swimming from the upper decks. You can
hear a wheezing, you take the ketone ester, you don't hear
anything. So yes, it definitely has anti inflammatory
effects. Now is that what's working the most
post workout? You know,
possibly yeah. Anthony, I just question maybe

(24:27):
for you but thinking about that that might make it less
of a post workout
concern. If you're trying to add muscle mass, would that be the effect because
you know you want some sort of inflammatory just
like you want to avoid, you know, antioxidants in the post workout period.
Avoid cold plunges unless you're like I said, like a fighter or

(24:49):
something like that where you need to mitigate that inflammation. There's,
there's reasons to do and not to do with as relates to anti
inflammatory products and the post workout period. But what are your
thoughts on, on that? I would tend to agree
and I can't take credit for this. I Learned this from Dr. Seeds.
But do the ketone ester with

(25:10):
trehalose sugar and trehalose
specifically. That was one of my next questions was combined with the trail. Can I
take it with the trailer host? Yeah. And I guess
the way it was explained to me I'll do my best to relay this
accurately. The trehalose is a sugar that we don't have very many
enzymes to break down. So it's going to be digested a lot

(25:32):
slower and works as a prebiotic.
So when we do it with the ketones
there's not as much inflammation as if we were going to do like a straight
glucose or dextrose or something like
that. Additionally, because we have
those elevated insulin levels post workout, it's refilling the

(25:54):
muscle glycogen stores and supporting a favorable shift
in microbiome. I think
like with a lot of the listeners, people that are in our
community having a goal of strength and
hypertrophy, I think there's some benefit to using
maybe a little bit of sugar. So you do have that stimulus of

(26:16):
inflammation but not too much. But
I definitely don't know as much as Frank on this. So I'm just speaking
from N of 1 and conversation that I had with Dr.
Seats. Well we did add that to our. Something similar to that to our
snake water. So our snake water is a ketone ester plus a bunch of
nootropics. But in there as well is isomaltilose, which is also

(26:38):
a slow carb that might do something similar, but it's a very low dose.
Like if you were to buy isomaltilose by itself, it would say 30 grams per
serving. This is just 3 grams. Just enough to keep your blood sugar from
dropping too much with the ketone ester. But as far as you know, we've
had many weightlifters that use this, especially if they do two workouts a
day. They take it after their first workout and they say that their second workout

(27:00):
feels as if they hadn't worked out that day. And if they didn't have the
ketone ester, their central nervous system just shuts down and you're having,
you know, half the workout. So I was going to say that's a. I don't
know exactly my experience that normally after
heavy training, you know, you just kind of have that like, I want to lay
on the couch feeling. But I don't feel like my central nervous system takes a

(27:21):
hit. And kind of to parrot what you said in terms of like the amount
of Trejalose that I use, it's never more than 10 grams
and that would be post workout and usually it's 5, 5 to 10
grams. So it's again, real small amount. And
I've used the product you're talking about. I love it.
And I have used that pre workout. My.

(27:43):
My favorite. And everybody thinks I'm weird, but I like the original ketone aid
without the sweetener in it. I think it tastes good. And I just drove
a couple of shots back and do the 5 grams of trehalose
and my workouts have just gone to a whole nother level.
So absolutely love it. Yeah, I want to talk about my
workouts with it as well here in. A little bit, but I will look

(28:06):
into the. If you're looking to build mass, whether the ketone ester might
be a step backwards, I'd have to find out about that. I don't know
because I think it does do other things that it seems. Like there's some other
pathways that it would be. That effect would potentially be,
you know, muted, mitigated, however you want to term that. But I
just. That's question. Good question. I would like to

(28:28):
know. What I'm finding the most fascinating
is the impact on,
you know, resetting metabolic dysfunction and mitochondrial kind of
Dysfunction. And this is, you know, you know, just in, you know, stealing
from Anthony and using with a number of my clients with those
issues. Typically I'll employ injectable acetylene L Carnitine

(28:51):
with a small window of a fast in the morning and now
adding the, the ketones to this, let's say a two
hour, two hour fast with that, some injectable acetylene L
carnitine and it seems to reset the entire day
for energy levels for folks. And
I'd love if there's anything that you can elaborate on what's

(29:13):
happening with that on kind of a cellular level.
I wouldn't know that. What I would suppose is that the ketone
ester does increase delivery of some medicines and
supplements. So like dopamine, if someone's on
Levodopa, they take ketone ester and they'll feel like they
took a double or triple dose, but not in a good way. So maybe

(29:35):
it's just increasing the potency of what you're already giving them.
Well, I'm thinking about from the ketone aspect because
you know, the issue that we're trying to, you know, direct
there is, you know, changing from a
glycolytic, you know, component to, you know,
processing through the liver, our fats, delivering,

(29:57):
you know, delivering that through the, to the bloodstream. And you
know, you could talk specifically just what the ketones are doing in that aspect. I
mean we can cover, and I think we may have covered in other
components what the acetylene L carnitine is doing and then
why the choice of injectable with that as it relates to, you know,
lipolysis and you know, liberating that fat

(30:19):
tissue. You don't need to speak to using those two together
because that's not your expertise. So I, I should be
clarify. I'm looking to just what's happening with the ketones
here in that, in that use in this,
you know, somebody with some metabolic dysfunction or you know,
mitochondrial dysfunction and processing and being

(30:41):
highly glycolytic, employing ketones with a small
fast, let's say a two hour fast in the morning. How does
that impact them as a whole? Well, just sugar. Sugar is the root
problem of everything. So those people with metabolic dysfunction are
having problems processing sugar. So this is just giving them an
alternative fuel source to bring them back to baseline, back to

(31:03):
normal. And some of the
critique about ketone ester is that it peaks at 45 minutes and then comes
down very quickly and people think that it's just gone, but they don't realize that
the ketones don't do anything in the blood. They don't make it more red or
more, you know, thin or anything. It, it is then starting
to go to the brain and to the muscles everywhere except for the liver. The

(31:24):
liver is the only place that it cannot, cannot help
but, which is. Where the acetylene L carnitine comes in. So which again, you don't
need the expertise in that. But so it's just, it's fueling
everything down to the mitochondrial level, just giving it,
recharging, giving it the energy that it should be getting from
sugar but it can't get. So it's just. The body's just starving. The way I

(31:46):
piece it together in my head, and please correct me if I'm wrong, is I
just kind of imagine an assembly line and it gets backed up.
We'll call that one when we're having sugar and people can't
keep up with it. So there's this, things are getting jumbled up, lack of
efficiency. And when ketones are introduced, it's like all of a sudden you
open up a whole nother assembly line and you can get caught up on that

(32:08):
workload and you're still able to go
back once the workload gets a little bit more manageable
and assemble the things on that first assembly line.
But it gives you that opportunity to catch up on things.
So the other way I kind of
think about it, and this might tie into the energy, is

(32:31):
that if somebody's in a state of glycolysis, they're making less ATP
than when they're able to use other fuel sources.
And when we introduce the ketones, it allows them
to have that metabolic flexibility where they can create more
ATP, which is ultimately going to be the currency of energy and even

(32:51):
get a little bit ahead on things. Yeah,
that's a better way to explain it.
I love it. Anthony's always got some great references that help
visualize. I had to make it simple for me. One
of the really cool things that I've found with the ketone
esters and again this is, I can't take credit for this. I Learned this

(33:14):
from Dr. Seeds. When we look at all these people that are having problems with
like post viral fatigue and Covid those sorts of
things, the number one thing, the first go to ketone
esters. And when we think about why it's just
checking so many boxes, it's reducing those inflammatory cytokines.
I think it's IL1B, IL

(33:35):
6. Frank's gonna know this and I'm
probably gonna mess it up. Is it 18 and 24? No, I. That.
That seeds level stuff. So I know that it helps with, you know, the. The
long Covid and the problems that you've been describing, but I don't get into
the individual things like that. The other
really cool thing about it, and I guess this is fairly

(33:58):
recent research, at least for me, is
it seems like they have improved myocardial
contractility for these post COVID
19 patients. When they use the ketone
esters and you think about, you know, that's pumping the blood
and the oxygen. And when we introduce these in

(34:19):
there, you know, it's like people feel awful after they're sick. And if we can
get them back to, you know, where the heart's pumping and oxygen
circulating, they're developing the ability to use multiple
fuel sources. There's so much we can do to recover faster from
these viruses and I would think even
strengthen the immune system. Yeah. And they are doing multiple

(34:41):
clinical trials on heart and heart failure. So the heart is just
far more efficient using ketones. There was One paper where
Dr. Beach saw it, where they somehow were able to
determine that when, in the instance of a heart attack, the body will
seek out ketones all the way down to the toes. I don't know how they
know that they're in the toes and like, suck it up because they need the

(35:02):
ketones. And this paper, seven years ago, they didn't even know about ketone
esters. And they're like, you know, the body loves ketones and they're.
They missed the connection. Well, now you can drink them.
So the science is still very, very early, you know, with all this
stuff. Yeah, it's really amazing. The. When we
talked previously, you did a beautiful job of explaining the difference between.

(35:24):
There's a couple different ketone esters there. And I knew
the. Obviously the ketonate is the one that I use. I knew it worked. I
knew it was the best. But really, you did a beautiful job of breaking
down what happens when you metabolize them and how
some of the other forms can actually be a central nervous system depressant and
put more of a load on the liver. So, yeah,

(35:47):
let's touch upon that. So there's R. Ketone ester is D
beta hydroxybutyrate bound to R13 butane dial. The D and the
R is what the body is bioavailable. Sometimes they use the D
and the R interchangeably, but then. So Another company
is C8 bound to R13 butane
dial. That's the one that is only 18% bioavailable. Because just the way

(36:09):
that the percentages of fat combining to R13
and it doesn't get into the bloodstream, it actually separates in the
gut. And you have all the C8, which they do
say you have to take it with food, which for me, 90% of
our protocols are without food. So if, if the first thing they
have to do is take it with food, well, then you have to take twice

(36:31):
as twice as much. It's just, you know,
they keep on changing the name of their brand, trying to, you know,
different marketing angles and it's just, you know, not working. You can
try it, but don't blame ketones for not
working. If you've used, if you've used that one.
There's one company that just put the two drinks ingredients

(36:54):
together without the bond and just said, oh well, let's just call it a
day. It's good enough. It's backed by science. But each one of these science papers
that they cite are ketone ester papers. And they just say, oh, well, it's close
enough. Well, it doesn't work that way in science. Not close enough. Or they'll.
It'll raise blood ketones 60% compared to the ketone ester. And they
say, oh, well, it's cheaper. So just drink 40% more and you'll be ahead on

(37:16):
a cost. But there's more to it. This whole, you know, Esther
and does Esther get into cells? Does Esther get into brain? Things we haven't
figured out yet. So that's a shortcut. And one guy called
me up and said, hey, I've been using your stuff for years. And I tried
to find a cheaper thing and I tried these two different companies. And you know,
yours says D beta hydroxybutyrate slash R13

(37:36):
butane butane dial. And there says D beta
hydroxybutyrate comma R13 butane dial. And the comma means that they
pour them together. And the slash meant that it was an ester. So we had
to change the wording to say a bond of this and this, to be more
specific, because this customer was like, when I take that drink and I walk my
dog, I like come back and I want to lay on the couch. It just,

(37:58):
why isn't it the same thing? And I did a whole 30 minute video
explaining it to him because I'm sure everyone else has that question.
Dom de Agostino has a ketone ester that he
did with mice that's not on the market. It's racemic. One, three Butane
dialogue bound to acetoacetate. And they claim that
maybe it will help you with your breath hold. And ironically

(38:20):
I tested the ketone esters is not scientific, but the breath hold actually went down
when I used our ketone ester. And I was like, hey, why does yours going
up? And one theory was maybe that product goes
backwards in the Krebs cycle, which might have some benefits for some.
You know, if deep sea divers have the bends
or something, there might be different uses for it, but it's just a

(38:41):
drastically different market. But it's still technically called the ketone
ester. So now scientists are calling it a ketone diester,
the Dominic ester, because there's two bonds in there and it's
just a different molecule does something different.
There's another one that is D beta hydroxybutyrate bound to
glycerol, technically a ketone ester, but not a ketone.

(39:02):
Monoester and the glycerol, basically
my understanding is that it converts into sugar and of the molecule you might
say, oh, 10 grams of ketones, but I think
70% of it is the glycol is the glycerol. So you only have
3 grams of the BHB. So again, not nearly
as bioavailable, but it looks cheaper when you're comparing gram

(39:24):
per gram. So there's a bunch of different companies trying
to come out with the next best thing. And then some companies will do just
BHB free acid, so they take out the salt. One company
that I thought was reputable on Amazon, it said it had 10
grams of free acid in an 11 gram pouch.
We tested it, it actually only had 50 grams

(39:46):
and there's no salt in there. But then the free acid is super
acidic, so it's a 2 ph and it
just doesn't get into the bloodstream nearly as well. We had a drink that we
discontinued that was a mixture of ketone ester, ketone salt,
ketone free acid, 60% ester and the rest the
mix, and ultimately abandoned that and just

(40:08):
stuck with the ketone ester, the ke4, the one that tastes
super strong. But then we came out with something just called ketone shot, which I
don't have around me, which is just a $5 shot
of 5 grams of ketone ester.
And that's basically the holy grail ingredient. Dr. Veach spent 40
years, and if you want to take a deep dive, read the book Ketones the

(40:30):
Fourth Fuel by Travis Christofferson. He spent 40
years figuring this out and you know, he would have picked
the right one decades ago.
Yeah. So I guess. Sorry, go ahead, Chris.
I was going to ask more on the combinations with
food because I had an interesting experience. So we've talked a little bit about

(40:52):
mixing with a little bit of slow digesting
carbohydrates like trailer hosts. You have one in your snake water
ingredient very small three to five, you know,
gram of a slow and that being okay to do.
I. And this might dive into a little bit more conversation on your
other product. The. The hard ketones. Oh yeah. Which have

(41:14):
slightly different, you know, use application but is more of
a kind of a weaning off of alcohol or an alternative to
alcohol is my take on it. Right. So not quite
as aggressive on you know, the
cognitive I guess recovery necessarily aspects like the Ketone 8 is
definitely. Or the KE4 would be the go to there.

(41:36):
Correct me wherever I'm wrong. But I think last year I
got a few cases of that and I used it and I wasn't feeling anything
from it, but I was drinking it at dinner and you
recently sent me some and I drank it in a fasted
state, not expecting anything like prior. And immediately I was like,
oh, I could feel this.

(41:59):
And it was like I said, I went through cases of it and I like
sometimes I drank like three in one sitting just seeing what if I could feel
anything and I wouldn't, but it would be like I'm having some ice
cream with dessert and then having those with it and then it just
wasn't doing anything for me. So. Yeah. So I don't know why. We don't know
why, but empty stomach, we try to scream on the side of the can. Empty

(42:19):
stomach. It just makes a drastic difference. So that drink like
it was like. I mean I literally, it was like, wow, okay, I.
I feel this like, I feel like really relaxed and
just like. Like I've had those kind of similar
effects to alcohol but without the, you know, the negative
effects of alcohol. It was really wild. Do you take enough where

(42:42):
you're like, I shouldn't be driving?
Yeah, I. I felt like on the verge of that like after the.
The one drink and before like I said I had three and felt
nothing. Because there are some drinks out there that are like calming recess
and stuff like that. And they, they tend to. They say that they have five
ingredients. Here's the secret. There's only one ingredient in those things that does anything

(43:02):
and that's L Theanine. That's it. Like everything else is just marketing.
Ashwagandha takes 30 days to work. It's all marketing. You want to save
money, you can just get, you know, a seltzer and, and take a pill
of pill or two of L theanine. This is
way, way, way stronger and different than those things.
And yeah, the empty stomach is key. We also found, ironically, that if you're

(43:25):
taking SSRIs or kratom, it just
blocks the buzz. So we give a guarantee if people don't feel the buzz, you
feel the buzz or you return it. And nine times out of 10, when I
ask a little questionnaire, it's like, oh, yeah, I do take SSRIs. Is that a
problem? Well, it's on the side of the can, it's on the. It's on the
email confirmation, it's on the website. For some reason, it's
blocking GABA receptors or something. We don't know why that

(43:48):
doesn't work. So the Hard Ketones is a second brand that we launched.
And the idea came from when I was talking to Dr. Veach, he
was explaining this D beta hydroxybutyrate in R13 butane
dialogue. It enters into the bloodstream and then it separates with enzymes
and you have the immediate release of the beta hydroxybutyrate free acid. And then
you have the R13 butane dial that goes through the liver

(44:11):
and gets converted to 80% of it converted back to
BHP. So then you have like a fast release and a slow release.
So I said to him, well, why not just give 25% more of the R13
butane dial and it, you know, cost much less. You don't have to make the
ester. And he said his answer was epic. He said the mice
were stumbling. The mice, it was just evident

(44:33):
that they were stumbling. So he was wanting to find something for
therapeutic uses that raises blood ketones, you know, to give the
grandmas. And he's like, you know, they toss that. And that's when I took it
out of the trash can and said, I think some people might want to stumble.
I mean, our goal isn't stumbling. Our goal is to have, you know, a nice
buzz, but a far, far healthier buzz. And some people
compare it to Star Trek, they have the Synthol drink,

(44:56):
which ours is even better than Synthol because Synthol is an alcohol
alternative that still gives them a buzz, no hangover. But then it doesn't
have this extra benefit of actually making ketones go up. And then
ketones get to do their own thing. So, yeah, the Hard Ketones
is a very exciting product for people trying to get off of alcohol. It blocks
alcohol withdrawal symptoms, alcohol cravings,

(45:18):
and it might be more per can. And, you know, people
scream about the per can price. I say, well, we could dilute it in half
and charge half as much. Would that make it, you know, better for you? You'd
have to drink twice as much. But, but people have used it as
a temporary transition to get off of alcohol, block the urges, and
then 30, 60 days later, they just get off of our stuff and just go

(45:39):
straight to water. It's. That transition is easy. But people that
drink one bottle of wine per night have reported that they are
able to drink two cans of our stuff and they just, you know,
didn't have that craving. And one person said that they had this Star
Trek type scan of their body, that they didn't know that
they had this desire and craving to go grab that wine

(46:01):
bottle opener. It was just gone. Now those people with
high tolerances, tolerances, they might not feel the buzz.
But then the second benefit kicks in, which is people think that the addiction is
to the buzz. It's not the buzz. Because then weed or THC
would relieve all alcoholics of their addictions, right? It doesn't. It's not the
buzz. It's the. I think maybe Anthony knows the

(46:24):
acetate, the alcohol ethanol
converts into acetyl aldehyde, which then converts to acetate. And the brain craves the
acetate. And then this helps block that,
that craving. So people with a super high tolerance won't feel a buzz, but
they're still. They'll feel calm and they just don't have that
desire for the. For a few drinks. Then they wake up and they're like,

(46:46):
they wake up feeling amazing because they're used to feeling like crap every
day. And that just becomes their new norm. And then suddenly they don't take it
one night and they're like, wow, this is amazing. And they wake up not
craving another drink of hard ketones. This one lady who
was six months sober, her husband said, you know, no alcohol in the house.
But then he understood the chemistry behind this, let her have some. She drank half

(47:08):
of a can. She was lucky that she did feel a buzz. So it's cheaper
for her. She put it back in the fridge and she said, hey, if that
was a six pack of beer, I'd have one sip. The entire six would have
to be gone. 12. And then I'd wake up in the morning and think, where
can I go and get my next 12 pack? She woke up and forgot that
she even had that half can. And you know, a couple days, a couple nights
later, she had the rest of it. So it's a really, really exciting

(47:30):
drink. But it's hard to grasp the concept of how is this,
you know, how is this possible? Because One company spent $20 million in the UK
trying to find an alcohol alternative that changes the molecule
that will not have the hangovers. And we
have it. All right, guys, we talk a lot about mental resilience on
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(47:52):
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(48:15):
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for 20% off. Yeah, no, I thought

(48:37):
that after that more recent experience it's like, wow, this is a phenomenal
product for that weaning off of alcohol. I haven't had a
drink for like a year and a half of alcohol anyway.
But yeah, I think that's a
really amazing potential. And that's where a spritz, a strawberry
spritz just came out. Oh, nice. We are working on concentrates now

(48:59):
that are the same amount of 17 grams of the R13 per
can. We're putting it into a small bottle so you can kind of put it
into a, into a seltzer and make your own cocktail, a little mocktail
or whatever. So yeah, that, that combination of food
you've talked about a few times, like you have to take more. One of the
things I was wondering about was, you know, as it relates, because I'm

(49:21):
just thinking about this. Well, for me,
I found that I can go back to some longer fasts very, very
effectively and especially employing it with pre workout. Like
I've had many, you know, like weeks or days recently where
I fasted, you know, all day, had my training session in the afternoon.
Amazing energy, feel great. But

(49:43):
when I think about fasting, I think about the impact of
like small things like even, you know, branch chain amino acids or essentially
amin acids will throw Somebody out of lipolysis
whey protein will do that. That's one of the reasons.
But I still like case name protein doesn't do that. So
if I'm in a fast, I may still have like I've got a product,

(50:05):
80, 20 protein and you know, have a scoop and
it's got 4 grams of whey in it, which is not enough to throw you
out of lipolysis. But would be combining
that caseinine somewhere in the timing with
the ke4
interfere or make you need to take more of the. Or should you

(50:27):
keep those separate? Is it a calorie or is it
just supplements? Is it actual calories
with that whey that you're taking? So
there's only 4 grams of whey in it. There's 16 grams
of casein in it. But caseinine I know is very different
than amino acids or whey because just in

(50:50):
relations to lipolysis. So that's where I was wondering if
that also changes it with the ketones. I don't know.
It's more of a food absorption and like a stomach absorption into the system.
That's why I was asking if it's calories because people when they take supplements, pills,
doesn't seem to block anything. It's just when there's substance and food that the body
needs to digest and break down it just the

(51:11):
ketones, it slows them down. Okay. So I, I
don't know, try different things, but I, I wouldn't know.
Yeah, okay. Yeah, I've been doing the, the ketones and then I'll do this like
you know, 45 minutes later and it seems to not affect it. But
I wanted to get some, you know, just see if you had any information as
it really. Yeah, the science is so early. Every little question like that is like

(51:33):
a two year clinical trial, every tiny question.
But there's a debate, you know, post workout, do you take it immediately post workout
and then hold off on the protein? Because people want to take protein right away.
And I, I do recommend separating, you know, separating the two
and not taking them immediately because some people would take the ketone ester and then
chug up a big smoothie. And I just, I just, I think

(51:55):
that'll block it. So I guess the best question there is what kind of
separation would make sense in, in that, in your mind?
Well, Dr. Dog talks about a two hour post workout. We did a
video. He's a doctor of one of the Quick Step team, one of the Tour
de France teams for Astana right now. And he Talks about this two
hour window where many things are happening for two hours. So he recommends two

(52:18):
hours, but some people do one hour. It
would take an entire clinical trial to figure out what's best. I think
ketones, protein is required in the world
of ketones not existing. Now that ketones exist, it just changes the
dynamics. And I don't know, maybe someone should do, I would love someone to do
some sort of recovery paper of ketones versus protein

(52:40):
because a lot of the papers right now are ketones versus sugar
or ketones versus sugar or ketones and sugar versus sugar, which is
a little bit different. So hopefully one day they'll,
someone will try to test that. Yeah, I've been playing around with
it a little bit and I remember reading that collagen synthesis is
upregulated for, I think it's actually 48 hours

(53:03):
after a workout. So I used to
do kind of the ketones and the shake right away. But what I do now
is the ketones and it's about 30 minutes and then I do
shake after that. But it sounds like I might even be able to push that
back a little bit more. The, the blood peak is 40 minutes.
Depending on the quantity that you take, the blood like blood peak can be at

(53:25):
40 minutes. So right when you're peaking, you know, adding the big amount of food,
okay, maybe it's already gotten into the system, so maybe that's enough, but I
don't know, maybe another 15 minutes. So I want to touch on that really quick,
Anthony, because yes, in the post workout period, collagen synthesis is
heightened over glycogen replenishment as well
as, you know, muscle protein synthesis.

(53:47):
But the timing of that, because of the absorption rate, I
recommend that you take the collagen pre workout
so that you take advantage of the post
workout elevated synthesis.
So that's my recommendation when it comes to optimal time
is, you know, obviously take it with your vitamin C because you, you know, lose

(54:09):
50. You know, it bumps the, the absorption by 50%.
But the, the it, that's correct. Post workout
collagen synthesis is upregulated more than others. But
because of the digestion timing and the timing of those things, take it in the
pre workout and then that'll actually be there the post workout, which then makes it
work really well with the ketones because, you know, the, the

(54:31):
collagen is from your GI tract is already gone.
You know, because you've worked out for an hour and a half. You probably took
the, the collagen two hours beforehand. So you got a Big window there
and you can maximize both of those. That makes sense. Yeah,
yeah. Talk real quickly about fasted workouts when
it was like running or cycling or even, you know, working out in the

(54:52):
gym. So some people will do fasted workouts before the ketone ester
was around because they knew that the inflammation was lower. They
knew of all these benefits. They could do more hard workouts per week, but they
expected that their watts and their performance would be lowered by 5 or 10%.
It's just an expectation, hey, I'm gonna be fasted, so I don't have a fuel.
But it has these other fat burning benefits. What we're finding with the ketone ester

(55:14):
and this is all not clinical trial stuff, this is all just anecdotal. Thousands of
people giving feedback is that their numbers are going back to
baseline. Even with a tiny amount of ketone ester, they're just going back to
baseline. Not better necessarily than all this glucose, but then they
have all the other benefits that they had if they
were just doing the fasted workout, the recovery and all those other things. So that's

(55:36):
kind of the goal is if you already know that you've done faster workouts, you're
like, oh, I don't like them because they're just, they don't have as much punch
to them. My reps aren't as much. You take a little bit of ketone ester
and you match your, your sugar performance with a lot less
calories. And then all the other benefits. I'm so I, I'm doing the
combination of the, the ketone and the another

(55:56):
Alcar shot of, you know, 2 to 300 milligrams.
And my performance is better than in the. I just
want to manage it. And that's what that. I don't want to oversell things. But
yeah, no, no, no. I'm just sharing my anecdotal
that, that is absolutely tremendous. So I'll
do ketones in the morning with

(56:19):
Alcar and then, you know, an hour or so later I might have some case
name and then this is on full day fasted where then
I'm training at like 4:00 and I might have another casening somewhere in the
afternoon, have another window and then
KE4 and another Alkar
shot. And my workouts are just through the roof. Like, I mean,

(56:40):
just awesome. Do you have any caffeine in your equation? Yes, I
do. So I'm taking full blitz, which Anthony's aware
of that. So it's a. We've got
nitrates, lack Lactate, but L. Citrinine,
beta alanine, beta anhydrous, arganine, nitrate,
calcium lactate, not for the calcium, but for the lactate

(57:02):
Rhodelia, L Theanine, and then for
the nootropics, I've got caffeine,
anhydrous and then
dmae. So, yeah, it's just
be aware that the ketone ester might be multiplying those things.
Okay. With and without. And

(57:25):
I would just be worried that it might be just multiplying
what you're taking by 3x and what you're feeling in the gym. This, you know,
revved up might be the, the increased delivery
of that that. I, I could see that, but at the. The
timing window. So I have this first because if I have caffeine, if I have
stimulants past three, it'll interfere with my sleep, but I'm not

(57:47):
seeing. So I tab it at 3, and then I'll have the ketone esters maybe
45 minutes later as I'm going to. To the gym.
But if this was ramped up at any level at the dose that I
take, I would have trouble and loss of sleep.
And my, my sleep scores on my aura
ring and my feeling of sleep have been

(58:10):
unaffected. But I definitely. I do
feel like it is hitting
harder for sure, but I'm not as in just
the mental cognition standpoint. But I don't feel
more like off the walls, bouncy or
any residual. And I come down off of it. Very good.

(58:31):
So. But thank you for making that aware for the audience. Yeah.
Your, your recovery between reps. Have you noticed anything
different there? Because that's something that it also does. So normally it
might a minute to recover. Now you're like, at 45 seconds, you're like, you know
what? I'm just gonna go back like that. Yes. Is a big difference for
weightlifters. Yeah, that is. That is definitely highly

(58:52):
notable, uh, and really important for me for
maximizing, you know, the, the window of time I have to train to get all
my work in, not having to. To do that. So, you know, wait. Some
people take the ketone shot and actually add it to their water bottle as well
to have a slow release, you know, during the workout. That's another way to take
a little pop in the front and then a slow release during. Yeah, I've done

(59:13):
that with the, the snake water that you sent. I sipped on that through the
workout, and that was great. But I haven't played with it since then.
Yeah. Anything else fascinating that
you're seeing? In the research that we haven't talked about as of
yet. Well, there's the EPO research, which I don't fully
understand because I know when you go to high altitude, the body will make

(59:35):
more EPO naturally. So it's mimicking some of the, that high
altitude benefits of epo. There's the
recovery paper. There was one paper where they were doing ketone ester and
sugar plus, you know, versus versus sugar by itself.
I said, please, can you have a third arm that's just ketones? And they're like,
no, there's no way that the ketones by itself could be better because you got

(59:57):
the two fuels versus the one. Sure enough, two years later, ketone
ester by itself increased performance by 4% in running
economy and 2% versus the combo. So by
itself in that exact instance does not mean that it's going to do for everything
else. And I need to make that very clear. Just that exact
instance with 10 people, it happened to be that the ketone ester worked better.

(01:00:19):
And my theory is that it's actually, it is kind of like a dual fuel.
It's your body making its own endogenous production plus
a little bit more of a boost of the exogenous production
on top of it. So you do kind of get those dual fuels. So that
paper was, you know, breakthrough. And then there's a paper where
the appendix talked about how ketones, the ketone

(01:00:40):
ester was taken and they were able to measure ketones in
the brain. And it stayed high for 90 minutes to
2, 90 minutes to 2 hours. And then they redid it and they haven't published
it. It stayed high for like three hours. Ketones in the brain. So again,
people think that it peaks at 40 minutes and then it's just gone. They showed
it in the brain super high. And they couldn't have the people in the MRI

(01:01:02):
scans sitting, you know, laying there any longer. They're like, gotta get them out. But
it was staying super high. There's some papers that don't
work that, you know, sometimes it's just a crapshoot. And you know, they're using the
ketones and the glucose. They try to show that ketones are
not muscle. There's a theory that it's glycogen sparing.
I never really liked that theory. So they tested it out by having

(01:01:24):
them take ketone ester, wait until the ketone ester goes to zero,
and then start the time trial to see whether it saves some
glucose from their warm up. And they didn't show Anything.
So there's, you know, there's a bunch of papers that show that it didn't do
anything. But I do tell people, don't take this on game day, because when it
works, it works. But when it doesn't work, it can impair your performance

(01:01:46):
severely. If it drops your blood sugar too much or you're. You're used
to a certain ingredient, but then you're switching out. Don't go
straight into game day. Use it half a dozen, if not a dozen times. Some
people actually will use it for the two weeks leading up to the event. And
then on the event, go back to the regular protocol for food.
And it has this, like mitochondrial building benefit two

(01:02:08):
weeks beforehand. And then they're getting PRs just by going back to their
apples gels, power bar protocol. But they're like,
hey, I felt lighter on my feet because the ketones still be in the system.
I'm like, no, it just was helping build
mitochondria. Made you more fresh, like you're tapering for the Olympics. I will say that
the ketone ester works better. The older you are,

(01:02:30):
the less mitochondria you have, the less. Yeah, I saw they're doing
some studies on frailty in older individuals with
the ketone esters. And yeah, I
think they're working on that. I think it might be a different ketone ester. But,
yeah, they. They're getting money for that.
So. And then the younger people, you know, they want to have

(01:02:52):
their own benefits. Like, okay, it might work for you, you know, these other pathways
and benefits, but it's not gonna. It might not make your brain as clear,
but towards the end of the workout, your brain does stop.
Does start to have some glucose metabolism
problems. So when your brain is just not as sharp as the end of a.
You're doing like, trail running or motocross. After half an hour, your brain

(01:03:14):
starts to fry. You take more glucose, and it won't go up there. It's the
same assembly line. The ketones will, you know, help
people that are mentally at a deficit. But if you're not at a
deficit, these younger people, you know, they might not feel it. Yeah, I do reports
from people that are like college students that are like, oh, you need to overnight
me the KE4, because he's been using it for studying and he

(01:03:35):
needs it for this final exam. So for some people, it works.
Some people, they can even lower their. Or remove their Adderall. People
are using instead of Adderall for mental clarity. But it's just. It's all
over the board, but it tends to work better for the older people. That
makes sense. Just like the TBI case as well. Right. So, you know, when it
comes to my, you know, the, the more degradation you have

(01:03:57):
had in mitochondrial function, the more impact it's going to play a
role. Yeah, absolutely. One of the really, I think that's.
Some really good clarity as a takeaway from this,
from this episode as well. Like, you know, it's, it's helping
restore the pathways. Right. And so if those pathways are in
great shape, there's less that it's going to. And making

(01:04:20):
new pathways because. Yeah, it's not necessarily restoring this. There could be
research that it might help restore the sugar delivery, but it's, it's this
new pathway to get there. Yeah. One of the cool things
that, I guess two of the cool things that I learned about
ketone esters and this kind of ties into the younger crowd.
I tell people, you know, keep taking them because it's actually going to upregulate the

(01:04:42):
expression of antioxidant genes and then it selectively
regulates histone deacetylase, which is going to be
gene copies. And those
two benefits. It's the kind of thing where like, you're not just going to take
it and be like, oh, no, no oxidation in my brain. But
as you continue to upregulate these antioxidant genes

(01:05:03):
and to kind of put it in context like what that means or how I
think about it. When we think about Modafinil and how effective that
is, a lot of its action comes from
antioxidant activity in the brain. And when these ketones are up
regulating antioxidant genes, you can see yet
another mechanism, another pathway that they're

(01:05:24):
supporting long term cognitive function and protecting that brain.
Yeah, yeah. So it'll definitely help with long term cognitive function. I just tend
to not talk about things that people don't feel immediately. I tend to focus
on whether you feel it or not. But yeah, there's science for
longevity, just straight up living longer,
whether you. The earlier you start, the better. Yeah. And that was a

(01:05:47):
question. I. That is a path I was gonna. That was
on my notes to ask you about. And Ryan Johnson,
you know, the king of longevity, he, you know, did a video
recently of his travel bag and there was ketone Esther in there. Our kids on
us are in there. Wow. I, I have trouble listening to
anything Brian says, but not saying he's wrong on

(01:06:10):
everything, but he wasn't paid. The point
was he wasn't. I know, I bought it. So.
So tell me, outside of that, I was just making a
joke. What? Yeah. So tell
me about any of the research as it relates to the longevity. Well,
there's a paper that Dr. Veach wrote eight

(01:06:32):
years ago, well above my pay grade. There's only like a handful of people that
can read these things and understand it. And he talks about, he
talks about all the animal studies where they gave a restricted diet or they put
them on a ketogenic diet, or they fasted and the animals lived longer. And there
are all these theories and he said the papers all missed the
point. It was the ketone, stupid. Each one of these trials triggered

(01:06:54):
BHB release and it was the BHB that was making, you
know, them live longer, not the caloric restriction and all these other
benefits. So, yeah, he's written a paper on that. I think they
did test the C.
Elegans. You know, it showed benefit with the C. Elegans for
longevity. So, yeah, it. There's a lot more

(01:07:16):
to it that I am not versed in because that's a slippery slope
with science. Maybe Anthony knows more about that, but.
It makes perfect sense to me when you think about the positive impact it's
going to have on cardiac function. Upregulating of
antioxidant genes and effects on histone deacetylase as well
as reduction of inflammatory cytokines. Those are all things that are going to

(01:07:38):
contribute to longevity. But that's a paper I'm going to
dig up. I'd absolutely love to read it. It's probably above my pay grade, But
I'll ask Dr. Seeds to explain it to me and hopefully
I'll be able to understand it a little better. But, yeah,
yeah, let's touch base on that later, Anthony, because I find that
that thought process, you know, obviously we know that caloric restriction has

(01:08:00):
an impact. It's been well studied, you know, and
anything but I always struggle with, you know, that approach because
it's also inhibiting, you know, muscle protein synthesis and the growth. Like there's a few.
And obviously not having mass on your frame as you get older is going to
have a negative impact as well. But thinking about this as an
entirely different pathway than just the caloric restriction is

(01:08:22):
really interesting. What you said really makes sense there. I, I definitely would love
to see that paper as well. I'll try to find you some papers, papers on
ketone ester and muscles. It does something that was unexpected on the
restoring and maintaining muscle as well. I remember.
I, I would expect that just as you know, intuitively
I just, I wonder what that, like how that operates.

(01:08:44):
Right. Because I, I just don't. Like I said, I. Obviously the
question is raised around the, you know, the anti inflammatory
nature of it in that period of time, but intuitively it just tells me
that that's not really, you know, all to the story. Right,
sure. The.
I think a great question for you, Frank, to give our listeners kind of a

(01:09:07):
takeaway would be if somebody's excited about trying
ketone esters, what would you say your starting protocol
would be? Just simple, generic. I
know there's so many different variations of it, but for somebody to start feeling
the benefits. Well, I asked Anthony Kunkel that he's a 50 miler runner
and I said, if you had one chance to give it to a skeptic, what

(01:09:29):
would that one time be? And he said, go for a long
run, whatever's long for you. It could be two miles can be long for you
or it can be. 50 miles in my car. And whenever your brain starts to
go, then take one full bottle of the ketone shot, this
small bottle, like this one full bottle of the ketone shot, and
see that Your brain within 5, 10 minutes goes back to baseline. So

(01:09:51):
that's one way to take it. The second no brainer way to take
it is for recovery immediately after your workout. How much to take?
Anywhere from, you know, I like to put it in terms of dollar amounts because
there's grams and there's water in these two different drinks. So anywhere from
two and a half dollars worth to $10 worth is what you can take and
find out, you know, how little you can use and what's, what's effective

(01:10:13):
for you pre workout that you have to like really
take a deeper dive because people want to follow the protocol, but then they want
to add the apple and just like, well, you know, this one runner,
marathon runner, he ran and he used it in his workouts for a
week. Loved it. Game Day fasted, Game Day added a
power bar and an apple and he's like, it was a horrible race. What happened?

(01:10:35):
I'm like, well, why'd you add the power bar and apple? He's like, well, I
need something for my race. Like, yeah, your body has pounds and
pounds of energy that, and that might have stopped
any of the endogenous production. It was horrible. The next time he actually took
it for a week or two and I told him Game Day to go back
to his regular eating, regular schedule program. And he's the one
that said, yeah, I had a 18 month PR felt light in my feet or

(01:10:58):
the ketones still in me. So. So we do have protocols on the website,
but they're very specific and it's harder to figure out. If you already
do fasted workouts, then it's an easy no brainer. You can add
one to two capfuls pre workout or one capful before and, and a
capful slow released into the water
bottle, that's easy. But if you're a big 300 calories of sugar and

(01:11:21):
caffeine eater and you drop that and you try to take, you
know, 10 calories of our stuff and you're like, oh, I didn't notice anything. It's
like, well it's, it's hard to compare those two things.
So. And then before bed you have to watch out. If you're taking it too
many times during the day, you're might want to skip before bed
because if you take a little bit too much before bed, it can kind of

(01:11:42):
turn on the brain and you don't want that. So once my wife was
like arranging the closet at 11pm, like what happened? It's like, oh, I try to
go to bed and I took, I normally take 2.5, but I took 5. And
then she's organizing the closet. So you have to find the exact amount. Some
people take as little as half of a cap, the actual cap half of a
cap full immediately before bed and they find the cortisol spikes. They don't wake

(01:12:04):
up two to three times they wake up. One person said my cell phone was
still on my chest when I woke up in the morning. Like they hadn't rolled
over all day. They were just deeper sleep, deeper
sleep. And that's the most cost effective way. If you can't use it any
other way, there's nothing better than improving your sleep. Like you can
help someone sleep. Everything else gets in the linetown.

(01:12:25):
So. Yeah. And then getting off of alcohol, there's nothing better that you can do
than even if it's just one glass of wine a day, you
can make a massive improvement to your health. Yeah, I found that even if
it's just a couple drinks a week, getting completely off alcohol is a game
changer. So. So that's what the, the hard ketones really
help people do that. So where can, where can people find

(01:12:46):
you and learn more? Yeah. So ketoneaid.com K-E
T O N E-A-I-D.com and then the hard ketone side,
we have hard ketones.com.
All right, well, I really appreciate you being on with
us and being on longer than we had scheduled. So much.
Appreciate that. No problem. Thank you very much. Really an honor to talk to you,

(01:13:08):
Frank. I appreciate you sharing so much knowledge and absolutely love your
product. I tell people anytime I travel, the first thing I pack is my
ketone aid. Well, it works with jet lag, too, so. It does.
Really? It works. Helps with the jet lag. Don't
eat during your 10 hour flight. Take a sip every
two hours and then you'll wake up. I mean, you. You'll land

(01:13:30):
10 hours away and go on a five mile run and you'll be
fine. Awesome. I'm definitely going to try that protocol. I
hate the impacts of travel. I hate it.
All right. Thanks again, Frank. All right. Thank you.

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